Original (=longer) version of my presentation for APIdays Mediterranea 2014 on government APIs, with special reference to statistical offices. May 29, 2014. Barcelona.

1. Gov APIs
The Notorious Case
of Official Statistics
APIdays Mediterranea
May 29 & 30, 2014
Barcelona
Xavier Badosa
(@badosa)

2. 2009

3. “APIs
2013
for WhiteHouse.gov?”

4. “What in the heck
2013
does that mean?”

5. > 500
2014

7. Gov APIs
Society as a
distributed system
enabled
by government

8. Gov APIs
!
Transform
government
into a platform

9. ·∙
is a very long word
Gov ern ment·∙

10. Service provider

11. Teller Window Interface

12. Teller Window Interface

13. Digital Window Interface

15. API

16. Better user interfaces
Integration into external processes
API

17. API
Write

18. API
Write
Not many

23. API
Read

26. Service provider
(data as a by-product)

27. Service provider
(data as a by-product)
open data ≠ gov as a platform

28. Service provider
(data as a by-product)
open data ≠ gov as a platform
open services

29. Service provider
(data as a by-product)
Data provider

30. Service provider
(data as a by-product)
Data provider
open data = gov as a platform

33. Book Interface

36. We
put
data
in
cells

37. data has no
intrinsic value
3.2

38. public transit system

39. data
as an
infrastructure

43. An infrastructure
is useless if nothing is built on top of it

44. Re-use
as a matter
of survival

45. To use again
in a new way
elsewhere

46. Mobility

47. Mobility
widget

48. Mobility
download

49. Mobility
API

50. The Richness of Language
verb object+
download
API
Get
Get…
all the data
the data I want

51. website
download
API
The Software Staircase
access
processing

52. maximum
data exposure
and reach
accuracy
preservation
brand awareness
the
Business
of
Reference

53. maximum
data exposure
and reach
API
FOUR-­‐LETTER
WORDS
AHEAD
FOUR-­‐LETTER
WORDS
AHEAD

54. maximum
data exposure
and reach
FREE
EASY
OPEN
API

55. maximum
data exposure
and reach
as in
free beer
FREE

57. maximum
data exposure
and reach
OPEN
as in
open air

65. Good for consumers
Good for the government
(savings, richer analytics)

66. Federated identity verification
of developers?

67. maximum
data exposure
and reach
EASY
as in
dead easy
1+1

68. The Fifteen Minute Rule
A person of reasonable
ability should be able to
get from zero to ‘Hello World’
in fifteen minutes.
Michael E. Driscoll
Metamarkets

69. maximum
data exposure
and reach
EASY
as in
dead easy
Apps are
already hard
Getting
the data
should be
dead simple

70. maximum
data exposure
and reach
EASY
as in
dead easy
Docless APIs
Standard
endpoints,
responses,
errors

71. [
[ "P0010001", "NAME", "state" ],
[ "710231", "Alaska", "02" ],
[ "4779736", "Alabama", "01" ],
[ "2915918", "Arkansas", "05" ],
[ "6392017", "Arizona", "04" ],
[ "37253956", "California", "06" ],
...
]

72. {
...,
"Results": [{
"series": [{
"seriesID": "LAUCN040010000000005",
"data": [
{
"year": "2013",
"period": "M11",
"periodName": "November",
"value": "16393",
"footnotes": [...]
},
...
]
}]
}]
}

73. {
"BEAAPI": {
"Request": {...},
"Results": {
"Statistic": "Per capita personal income",
"UnitOfMeasure":"dollars",
"PublicTable":"CA1-­‐3 Personal income summary",
"UTCProductionTime":"2014-­‐05-­‐11T17:02:55.817",
"NoteRef":"2", "Dimensions": [...],
"Data": [
{
"GeoFips":"00000",
"GeoName":"United States",
"Code":"PCPI_CI",
"TimePeriod":"2009",
"CL_UNIT":"USD",
"UNIT_MULT":"0",
"DataValue":"39357"
},
...
], "Notes": [...]
}
}
}

74. {
"JSONDataResult": [
{
"AgencyName": "MCC",
"Amount": "-­‐6983525",
"BenefitingLocation": "Ghana",
"Category": "Economic Development",
"FiscalYear": "2013",
"Sector": "Agriculture"
},
...
]
}

75. {
"columns": [
{ "code":"region", "text": "Region" },
{ "code":"ageG5", "text":"Age", "comment": ... },
{ "code":"period", "text":"Time", "type":"t" },
{ "code":"x", "text":"Population", "type":"c", "unit":"amount" }
],
"comments": [...],
"data":[
{ "key": ["02","0-­‐7","2003"], "values": [ 100 ] },
{ "key": ["02","0-­‐7","2004"], "values": [ 101 ] },
...
]
}

76. [
{...},
[
{
"indicator": {
"id": "NY.GDP.MKTP.CD",
"value": "GDP (current US$)"
},
"country": { "id": "BR", "value": "Brazil" },
"value": "1620165226993.77",
"decimal": "0",
"date": "2009"
},
...
]
]

78. SDMX,
RDF,
LGDx

79. SDMX

80. [
{
"area_name": "Panama",
"measurement": "tonnes",
"value": 1152.87890625,
"year": 2007,
"footnotes": [...]
},
...
]
Unofficial

81. A Data-to-Provider(s)
Translation Protocol?

82. Service provider
Data provider
Write APIs
Common APIs

83. JSON-­‐stat.org

84. {
"dataset": {
"status": {...},
"dimension": {...},
"label": "Value (NOK 1 000) by imports/exports...",
"source": "Statistics Norway",
"updated": "2014-­‐05-­‐13T18:36:18Z",
"value": [ 77287250, 70377617, 73499048, ... ]
}
}

86. Thank you !
Gov APIs
The Notorious Case
of Official Statistics
Xavier Badosa
(@badosa)

87. B&W road by Niamor83 (CC BY-­‐NC-­‐SA). Color road by Xavier Badosa
(CC BY). Snake by Brewbooks (CC BY-­‐SA). Teller window by Lorianne
DiSabato (CC BY-­‐NC-­‐ND). We're closed sign by Leol30 (CC BY-­‐NC-­‐SA).
Book by Chris “shutterhacks” (CC BY). Metal movable type by Willi
Heidelbach (CC BY-­‐SA). Zeros and ones by Josh Bancroft (CC BY-­‐NC).
Prison Cell by Donkeycart (CC BY-­‐NC). Railroad by Xavier Badosa (CC BY).
Dartboard by Jacob Vance (CC BY-­‐NC). Beers by Evil Sivan (CC BY-­‐NC-­‐SA).
Sea by Grant MacDonald (CC BY-­‐NC). Clock by Christian Cable (CC BY).
Bottle by Prizmatic (CC BY-­‐NC). Reduce Reuse Recycle by Steve Snodgrass
(CC BY). Computer icon by Danilo de Marco. Woman profile icon by
VisualPharm (http://www.visualpharm.com). Spermatozoa, author
unkown.
Credits